The Road to $1 Billion Savings

WEBINAR:On-Demand

Enterprise Information Management developed a system that automated the Army's annual personnel fitness and evaluation reports, saving a $1 billion annually. They started with a consultative engagement that began with business objectives and processes, not technology. Here's how they did it.

Consultative and business alignment selling is a growing practice among
solution providers who are looking for new methods of demonstrating and
delivering value to their customers. Hardware sales and margins have been
declining for years, and took a nosedive in the recession. On-premises software
sales and margins are increasingly under pressure, especially in the cloud
computing era. And even prepackaged suites and infrastructure strategies are
criticized as being means for pushing point products on end users.

Consultative business-technology sales start with the business problem and
objectives. EIM and other solution providers who align solutions to business
needs delve deeply into the root cause of the business challenges or problems,
analyze current and proposed processes, and develop systems—procedural as well
as technological—to meet those objectives.

"We were all about deploying technology in silos and making them more
efficient and effective. Now, it’s about making those silos smarter," says
Joann Duquid, vice president of Economic Stimulus and Industry Marketing at IBM.

This is the approach taken by Business Technology Partners, a
Manhattan-based solution provider that evolved from supporting Wall Street
financing and trading firms to become a specialist in designing and
implementing IT systems for the hospitality, legal and health care industries.
In one of its current projects, BTP is working alongside building contractors
and structural engineers along with business and IT managers to create a
holistic IT system for the new Trump SOHO, a 46-story luxury hotel and
condominium high-rise in the heart of Manhattan.

When the Trump SOHO opens in the fall, all of its data and voice systems for
guests, residents and management will run over the same Cisco-based network.
Facilities operations—heating and cooling, electrical systems and physical
security systems—will run over the same lines as the in-room entertainment
systems. And while the building and hotel staff will run the day-to-day infrastructure,
BTP will provide the remote monitoring and maintenance of the servers and
network infrastructure through a managed service.

"In all such projects, we’re seeing an appetite to enhance the experience
and reduce staffing requirements, and thus create efficiencies," says BTP President
Joshua Aaron.

Achieving such levels of integration requires tremendous effort by BTP in
understanding Trump’s hotel operations and business objectives, designing
systems around those objectives, and then coordinating with contractors and
engineers. In the case of the Trump SOHO, BTP worked with building project
managers from the day the foundation went into the ground. Now that much of the
superstructure of the building is complete, BTP will begin the work of installing
the local data center and running cables.

Of course, BTP had the advantage of working from a clean slate on the Trump
SOHO. In other hotel renovations and IT infrastructure upgrades, it had to work
around the legacy physical constraints. In enterprise settings, legacy
obstacles often include longstanding workflow and processes. EIM accounts for
that in its initial consulting engagements and plans technology deployments in
a manner that won’t disrupt corporate culture.

In the Army personnel review deployment, EIM designed an automated,
paperless system built on IBM Websphere
software. For the first time, fitness and performance reports would be
completed entirely online, saving millions of dollars in postal costs alone.
But the EIM couldn’t flip the switch to a fully automated system overnight.
Over a three-year period, EIM gradually built out the system, periodically
adding capabilities to acclimate users to the paperless process.

The advice EIM’s Garst gives: Do not disrupt the accepted way of doing things
by rushing deployments and ensure that value—often in the form of cost savings—is
recognized immediately.

"It’s all about baby steps," Garst says. "Every CIO
is nervous to take that next step because they know that every move they make
is being watched like a hawk."

The consultative sales model has the added benefit of transferability. EIM
and BTP both report developing systems that grow dynamically within
organizations once the initial deployment is completed. Likewise, those same
systems and methodologies are applicable to other environments, relieving
solution providers of having to reinvent systems for each customer.

Lawrence Walsh is editor of Baseline magazine, overseeing print and online editorial content and the strategic direction of the publication. He is also a regular columnist for Ziff Davis Enterprise's Channel Insider. Mr. Walsh is well versed in IT technology and issues, and he is an expert in IT security technologies and policies, managed services, business intelligence software and IT reseller channels. An award-winning journalist, Mr. Walsh has served as editor of CMP Technology's VARBusiness and GovernmentVAR magazines, and TechTarget's Information Security magazine. He has written hundreds of articles, analyses and commentaries on the development of reseller businesses, the IT marketplace and managed services, as well as information security policy, strategy and technology. Prior to his magazine career, Mr. Walsh was a newspaper editor and reporter, having held editorial positions at the Boston Globe, MetroWest Daily News, Brockton Enterprise and Community Newspaper Company.

By submitting your information, you agree that channelinsider.com may send you channelinsider offers via email, phone and text message, as well as email offers about other products and services that channelinsider believes may be of interest to you. channelinsider will process your information in accordance with the Quinstreet Privacy Policy.

By submitting your information, you agree that channelinsider.com may send you channelinsider offers via email, phone and text message, as well as email offers about other products and services that channelinsider believes may be of interest to you. channelinsider will process your information in accordance with the Quinstreet Privacy Policy.